How do we support employees who are parents of disabled children?

Honour the statutory floor first

Support here is part legal duty, part good practice. Take the duties first. Start with the day-one legal rights: flexible-working requests, one week’s unpaid carer’s leave a year (Carer’s Leave Act 2023), and emergency time off for dependants — then add paid leave and a flexible manager. All three rights apply from the first day of work, with no qualifying period. Carer’s leave is one week of unpaid leave in any 12 months to give or arrange care; it turns on a long-term care need, which includes disability, so the child does not need a formal diagnosis for it to apply Acas. Emergency time off for dependants covers the unplanned days, such as a sudden illness or a call from school Employment Rights Act 1996, s.57A. And since 6 April 2024 a request for flexible hours or a flexible pattern is also a day-one right: the old 26-week qualifying period was removed Flexible Working (Amendment) Regulations 2023, and you must now reply within two months and consult the employee before you turn one down Flexible Working (Commencement) Regulations 2024.

The legal risk most employers miss

Here is the trap the top guidance tends to skip. Treating a parent worse because of their child’s disability can be unlawful direct discrimination, even though the parent is not the disabled person. The Equality Act bars less favourable treatment because of a protected characteristic, and it does not say the characteristic has to be the employee’s own Equality Act 2010, s.13. This is discrimination by association, settled in the Coleman case. So refusing leave, blocking a flexible pattern, or penalising child-related absence can itself be discrimination. One limit worth knowing: the duty to make reasonable adjustments runs to the disabled person, not to the carer, so the protection sits in direct discrimination and harassment rather than in adjustments.

Then the good-practice layer

Above the floor sits the part the law does not require but that actually keeps people in work. Consider paid carer’s leave rather than the statutory unpaid minimum, a written carer’s policy, and a carer’s passport that records what is agreed so it does not have to be re-explained to each new manager. Point people to your Employee Assistance Programme and to Carers UK, Working Families and Contact. Most of all, make sure staff know these entitlements exist, because a right nobody is told about goes unused. A flexible, sympathetic line manager is worth more than any single policy.

This page is general information, not clinical or legal advice.